While Josh Trank’s ill-fated Fantastic Four reboot failed to create a new franchise for Marvel’s First Family, the 2015 movie was ahead of the comic book movie curve in at least one important respect. The writer-director made the bold choice to cast Michael B. Jordan — who had recently starred in Trank’s breakout directorial debut, Chronicle — as Johnny Storm aka the Human Torch, who had traditionally been depicted in comics and onscreen as a white character. (In fact, Jordan’s live-action predecessor was none other than future Captain America Chris Evans.) In a recent interview on the Geeks of Color podcast, The Meaning Of, Trank revealed that he had similar intentions for Johnny’s sister, Sue Storm, and their father, Franklin. “I was mostly interested in a black Sue Storm and a black Johnny Storm and a black Franklin Storm,” he said.
In the end, Trank successfully cast Jordan as Johnny and veteran character actor Reg E. Cathey as Franklin. (Cathey died in 2018.) But on the podcast, he claimed that executives at 20th Century Fox — which owned the rights to Fantastic Four prior to being purchased by the Walt Disney Company — prevented him from choosing a black actress as Sue. “I found quite a bit of heavy pushback on casting a black woman in that role.” The director and the studio eventually agreed on House of Cards star Kate Mara as Sue, who is described as Johnny’s adopted sister in the film.
In interviews at the time, Trank described how casting Jordan and Mara as siblings spotlighted the diversity of contemporary families. “I have mixed family in my own family, and it’s something that isn’t out of the ordinary anymore, but we don’t really see it portrayed in the casual reality of the movies,” he told Collider in 2015. “That’s something I felt that would be interesting and challenging, to have mixed siblings.” Reflecting on the experience on The Meaning Of, though, he framed his concession to Fox as more of a personal failure.
This article was originally posted on yahoo.com/entertainment/.
